Charon
by jimra
Summary: Strange Dreams...and some of the meaning behind them. Also find out what the Senshi are up to. This one has some elements of a fusion, but it is mostly an AU BSSM crossover with a continuation for Ranma.
1. Prologue

Charon – A Ranma 1/2 / Sailor Moon Crossover Fanfic

by jimra

I don't own 'em.

Prologue

His katana raised to point at his opponent's throat, the man allowed his black cloak to slide to the ground from his shoulders.  With a negligent flick of his head, he resettled his black ponytail between his shoulder blades and faced his opponent, a confident, even arrogant, smirk crossing his lips.  Eyes narrowed and katana in guard position, the man stepped forward, the arrogant look falling from his face into one of concentration.

He wore black plate armor, lacquered and shining in the wan light of Neptune.  Each piece, from bracers to greaves, was flawless, as though never used.  However, it was obvious from the man's preternatural grace as he moved forward and his opponent's worried face that the armor had seen a good deal of combat.  The man's black, soft leather boots made no sound as he stalked forward, and his blue-grey eyes spoke of nothing but death for the one who would challenge him.

The opponent of this dangerous, black-armored man was actually a tall woman with short, blonde hair.  She wore the standard white body suit and short skirt of a Senshi, and the colorful uniform contrasted with both the man's armor and the desolate landscape that was the only witness to this duel.  She visibly shored up her courage and dropped into a fighting stance, low and defensive.  Slashing her hand through the air, a sword suddenly appeared in her hand, and she raised it to counter the man's katana.  A cold wind stirred her short blonde hair as she took a brief, calming breath.  Finally, as the dramatic moment ended, she spoke.

"Well, Charon?"  The woman's voice was cold and dead, as though she were a ghost.  "You stopped us from going to the aid of our Queen!  That same Queen you swore to defend!  And now you dare come here and face me?"

Though he didn't lower his guard, the man smiled.  "You know full well why I stopped you, Uranus.  There was nothing you could have done.  So it was ordained by the Gate.  The Silver Millennium had to end today, and there was nothing any of us could do.  I would not see a temporal paradox destroy any chance of regaining what has been lost."

Through out his speech, Charon's voice was calm and cold, no emotion betraying his own pain at allowing the Silver Millennium to die.  He was the guide of death and the Senshi of Space; nothing would pierce the cold shroud he used to smother his emotions.

"Now it is time to sleep, Uranus," Charon continued.  "You may choose: it can be the cold embrace of a suspension tube... or the colder embrace of death.  Either way, we will return when we are needed.  Now choose."

Uranus' eyes widened slightly when he spoke, but not too much.  She had to know the choice she would be given: Sailor Charon, the Senshi of Space and Death, held sway over Hades itself.  There was a good reason he was named after the boatman of the river Styx.  He was not as powerful as the Senshi of Silence, but he was definitely a close second.

Before either spoke again, a brief flash of light indicated a teleportation spell entry point opening to Charon's right.  Knowing Uranus would do the same, he lowered his weapon and turned to the new arrivals.  His face softened as two of the three walked toward him, the rest of the world tuned out.

Sailor Pluto gently slipped her arms around her husband and kissed him; it was not a kiss of passion but one of comfort and love.  After a moment, the two separated and Charon knelt to greet the smallest Senshi, a smile always on his lips for Saturn.

"And how are you, Aeris?" he asked in a soft, kind voice.  "I'm sorry we couldn't do anything for them."

The little fuku clad girl tried to smile, but Charon could tell she was barely holding in the pain.  "I'm..." she started shakily, but then stopped.  Visibly taking control of her emotions, she forced herself to smile back to him and spoke in a much stronger voice.  "I'll be okay...  I just hate the idea that we didn't do anything."

"I know, imouto-chan," answered Charon, his voice heavy with regret.

Standing, the pony tailed man turned to face his wife and fellow Senshi of Death.  "Setsuna... I didn't expect to see you until returning to Charon.  Is something wrong?"

"No... At least, not with the plan," the green haired woman answered.  "I just finished my conversation with Neptune faster than expected."

"Which did she choose?" Chiron asked gravely.

"The stasis tube," replied Pluto quietly.  "But Aeris wants to join us.  I don't really want that for her, but it is her choice."

"I understand your apprehension, but it isn't particularly dangerous.  We just have to die for a few millennia."

Charon briefly reflect on how strange that must sound to anyone who didn't know that he and Setsuna were the Senshi of Death, but he quickly quashed that line of thought as unimportant.

After a moment more of thought, Charon turned to Uranus, who was now being held by her lover, Neptune.  "Well Haruka, Michiru.  Have you decided?"

Anger still froze Uranus' face, but her soft voice was resigned.  "We will take the stasis tubes..."

There was nothing more to be said; Charon nodded once and drew on his powers from the Gate of Time and Space.  Raising his hand toward the two, his palm glowing black with power, he saw Pluto mirror his action.  At an unspoken signal, the two Senshi with power over time and space released their combined spell.  Standing before the remaining three Senshi stood two tubes, their silvery exterior shining in Neptune's light.  Through the blue-tinged stasis field, Sailors Uranus and Neptune slept, their faces peaceful in their repose.

With a negligent wave of his hand, Charon bent the fabric of space to deposit the two frozen Senshi each in their respective planetary castle.  Then he turned to Saturn.  "Aeris, think carefully.  Are you sure you want to come with Setsuna and me?  We can put you in stasis, just like we did to the other Outers."

Through the false smile on her face, Charon could see her fear.  Even as the Senshi of Destruction and Creation, little Saturn couldn't truly fathom dying in the same way Charon or Pluto could, and she was very frightened.  However, the Senshi of Space could see something else in the little girl he'd adopted as his sister, a fear greater than dying: she didn't want to be alone.  If put into stasis, she would awaken alone in her castle on Titan.

"You know, even though you'd be with us for death, you wouldn't necessarily be reincarnated with us..."  Charon said after reading her face.

"I know..." she answered.  "But I still want to go with you and Onee-chan."

The pony tailed man smiled and held out his hand to her.  "Very well, then it is time to go."

As they were talking, Pluto came to stand by her husband, and when he said that it was time, she reached out and took his other hand, a reassuring smile on her face when Charon looked at her for a moment.

Putting thoughts of his wife aside, the Senshi of Space reached out and warped the fabric of space again, bending it until they arrived on the surface of Terra's moon.

"By Kami-sama!"  Pluto's voice was breathlessly amazed.  "I cannot believe that Beryl did this!  There is almost nothing left..."

"And going with the plan," said Charon.  "There will be nothing at all.  Are you ready, love?"

Setsuna turned to her husband and shared one last passion-filled kiss with him, one that Charon was sure was meant to remind him of all of their love.  In that thought, he returned her passion with equal vigor, stopping just short of allowing himself to fulfill that passion.

Finally breaking the kiss, Charon stroked his wife's beautiful face, gently brushing a stray green hair from her cheek.  "Always remember," he said in a tender voice he reserved only for her.  "I love you."

"And I, you, anata."

With a small smile on his face, he turned to Saturn.  "Are you ready, Aeris?"

Her reply was a slight, trembling nod before she walked over to Setsuna.  The Senshi of Pluto kneeled next to her adopted sister and held her tightly in her arms.  Charon nodded to the two most important women in his life before turning once more to look at the devastation.  Nothing was left of the palace or the grand garden.  The most beautiful places in the Sol system were now piles of rubble, and after he was done, nothing but a white, barren wasteland would remain, bereft of even air.  Finally, Sailor Charon, Senshi of Space and Death, raised his arms and whispered his strongest attack, an attack he'd hoped never to use.

"Charon Void Sunder."

Ranma woke with a scream, still seeing the dream of space being ripped apart.  The pigtailed martial artist sat in his futon, gasping for breath.  The dream had seemed so terrible... so real.  Sweat covered his face and soaked the muscle shirt he wore, and his mind still couldn't shake the feeling that the dream was more than just a dream.

The pigtailed boy looked briefly over at his father's empty futon, but then he remembered that Happosai had taken his pop and Tendo-san on a training trip.  Shrugging the foreboding feeling from his mind, Ranma stood and walked out of the Tendo's guest room.  Quietly walking down the stairs, the dark haired martial artist went into the kitchen and poured himself a glass of water.  Downing half of it, he walked into the living room intending to head for the furo, but the boy stopped when he saw a figure sitting on the tatami next to the table.  In the moonlight, Ranma had to struggle to make out the silhouette of the middle Tendo sister.

"Nabiki?" he said in a quiet, uncertain voice.  "What are you doing up so late?"

As she turned toward him, her face was illuminated by the bright, full moon, and Ranma was shocked to see tear tracks running down the Ice Queen's face.  Her eyes were almost pleading with him, but for what, he didn't know.

Since the failed wedding attempt nearly three months previous, Nabiki had been much nicer to him, and although he was suspicious at first, the middle Tendo sister had managed to work her way through all his defenses and become a friend.  It surprised him when managed to find the real person underneath all the ice she used to deaden her emotions, but that girl was there.  Now, Ranma was really worried.  In a concerned voice, Ranma said, "What's wrong, Nabiki?"

The short haired girl motioned for him to sit, and as he did so, she spoke, her voice both fearful and hopeful.  "I've been having strange dreams lately, Ranma."

This alone froze Ranma in the act of sitting next to her.  Of course this was a bad thing, and while his mind tried to assess this piece of information, his body lost its balance.  The net result of this was Ranma lying on his back with his head cradled in Nabiki's lap, his eyes just a bit wider than dinner plates.

An amused smile crossed Nabiki's face as she looked down into Ranma's eyes, but it didn't seem that a bit of slapstick would make her forget about her problems.

Unfortunately for all involved, this was the moment the lights flicked on.

"RAAAAANNNNNNNMMMMAAAAA!!!!"

Three guesses as to who found Ranma with his head in Nabiki's lap, and the first two don't count.  Unfortunately for Ranma, something other than dodging Akane's mallet froze him in position.  The last thing he thought before becoming airborne was, 'Since when was Nabiki's hair... green?'

Very far away from where kawaiikune fiancées were malleting pigtailed martial artists into koi ponds, the hiss of escaping gas was heard deep within a stone structure that had heard no sound in nearly thirty millennia.  In a stone chamber on Neptune's moon Triton, deep within a castle modern science had no idea existed, a large, silver and blue tube released its containment locks.  After about five minutes, the final locks were released and the blue-tinged stasis field winked out of existence.

A hand emerged to grasp the sides of the tube, and very shortly, Sailor Neptune sat up from her long sleep.


	2. Chapter One

Charon

A Ranma ½ / Sailor Moon Crossover Fanfic by jimra

I don't own 'em.

Chapter One

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Titania had never been the garden spot of the Sol system, and now, after Beryl scoured most of the system of life, it was even less appealing. Still, one person made her home on Uranus's largest moon, and despite the airless, frozen desolation outside, Castle Uranus still held an atmosphere and comfortable temperature. That one resident, newly awakened after nearly twenty millennia of stasis, now sat at a crystalline console, deep within the last remaining structure on Titania, and she carefully studied the information being displayed on the screen, one hand idly playing with her short blonde hair and a small frown of concentration on her face.

A moment later, the tell-tale hum of an active psi-gate caused the woman to turn, and a smile immediately replaced her frown when she saw the new arrival: a woman with long turquoise hair and a regal bearing. The Titania native stood and approached her visitor, embracing the other woman and giving her a passion-filled kiss, their first since the Great Fall. After what seemed like an eternity, Tenou Haruka pulled back from her lover and beheld Kaiou Michiru at arms length, her eyes drinking in the sight of her soul mate. Finally, after several minutes of comfortable silence, Michiru spoke.

"Have you been awake long, love?" she asked, her low soprano voice full of calm and elegant poise.

"Just since yesterday, Michiru," Haruka answered in her own low alto. "I was going to come to Triton, but I wanted to assess the situation first."

The green-haired woman nodded and looked over her lover's shoulder at the console Haruka had been using before she arrived, her keen mind quickly drinking in the displayed information. Seeing a particular reading, Michiru's eyes narrowed, and her brow wrinkled in a frown. Haruka turned to look at the display, and she raised one hand to point at a particular read-out, saying, "I don't like these readings we're getting from Terra."

"I know, that's what I was looking at," replied Michiru, her tone dark. "It doesn't look like the readings aren't conclusive, but there is a good possibility that our old enemy is operating on Terra."

"I thought Pluto said that our stasis tubes would automatically awaken us if the sensors detected Deathbuster signatures entering the solar system!" Haruka growled, anger in her voice. "I swear, we never should have trusted her and Charon."

Michiru sighed, putting a calming hand on her lover's shoulder. "Relax, Haruka. You know that happened quite a long time ago, and they're both dead now."

Still angry, the blonde woman nodded nonetheless, replying, "I know, but it seems like only yesterday."

"Well, it's not like we were aware in stasis," the haired-haired woman said, a wry grin on her face. "To us, I guess it was yesterday." Turning serious again, Michiru continued. "In any case, we need to go to Terra and assess the situation. If the Deathbusters really are there, we have to stop them."

Haruka nodded, but just as she was going to take Michiru's hand to use a Sailor Teleport to Terra, another reading caught her eye. "Take a look at this, Michiru."

"That's Silver Millennium energy," replied the sometime Senshi of water. "But I thought we were the last survivors of the Senshi."

"Charon said something about reincarnation," said Haruka, her tone one of wonder. "Maybe it's them."

Michiru shrugged. "If the Deathbusters really are on Terra, we could use their help."

"Maybe," answered the blonde-haired woman, anger clouding her voice again, "but I still want a chance to beat the crap out of Charon and Pluto for what they did."

"Relax, love," Michiru said soothingly. "Let's leave that until after we make sure that Terra is safe from the Deathbusters."

Reluctantly, Haruka agreed with her lover, and without another word, she took Michiru's hand, both women's clothing transforming into the ubiquitous white body suit and short skirt of a Sailor Senshi. A moment later, a bright flash illuminated the room, and Sailor Uranus and Sailor Neptune vanished from Titania.

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It was a strange place: dim but not dark, filled with slowly stirring fog, and her black-booted feet made loud clicks with each step, so the unseen ground must have been a hard surface. The lack of echoes told her that the space must be immense, but she didn't think that the area could possibly be a natural landscape.

She stopped walking, reflecting that she didn't even know why she had been moving, and looked down, studying her strange outfit. The white body suit and short black skirt, complete with black bows on the center of her chest and at the small of her back, could have been a school uniform, but not from her school. The white gloves, trimmed in black, that covered her arms to the elbow, however, were certainly not a normal seifuku accessory, and choker and tiara she could feel on her neck and brow were definitely not her usual style.

Unconsciously, she raised her right hand to finger the bejeweled tiara, and accidentally brushed a lock of hair across her face, the short green strand startling her. Her hair was not supposed to be green. She sighed; nothing in this place was making any sense. Finally, she decided that she must have been walking for a reason, even if she didn't know what that reason might be, and ignoring her confusion, she continued on her way through the fog.

After about five minutes more walking, and indistinct shape appeared in the fog ahead of her, and as this was the first object she had seen since arriving here, she began to walk faster. The shape was tall, at least twice her height, and as she approached, she could see that it was a set of doors, enormous white stone doors carved with the phases of the moon. The strangest part, however, was that the enormous gates were freestanding, apparently going nowhere. She walked around the doors just to be sure, and after returning to the nominal front of the object, she muttered, "This is just too strange; it's got to be a dream."

"Why do you think so?" answered a voice behind her, and she spun, startled. The owner of that voice, a tall, elegant woman with very long dark-green hair and red eyes, was dressed in an outfit identical to her own, and in the woman's right hand she held a staff with a large red orb on its head. "Is this really so strange?"

"You better believe it, lady," she replied. "Nothing like this could possibly be real."

"You are both right and wrong, Tendo Nabiki," said the woman with a small smile, and she turned her head to regard the gates. "This place is real, but this is also a dream."

Nabiki's eyes narrowed, not happy with such a double answer. "So I'm dreaming about a real place? I doubt that; this place can't exist in reality."

The red-eyed woman stepped forward, coming to stand next to Nabiki, and the middle Tendo daughter turned to regard the woman in profile. Without turning to face her, the woman spoke again. "Most reincarnations never remember their past lives, and those few that do only remember bits and piece, slowly, over time…but not you. You have a rather special connection with time, so instead of getting it a little at a time, you're going to get it all at once."

Nabiki blink-blinked. 'Special connection with time?' she thought incredulously.

"Yes," the woman answered, startling Nabiki again, "and yes, I can hear your thoughts."

"Who the hell are you, anyway?!" Nabiki blurted out, too off balance at this point to use her famous business acumen and emotional control.

"My name is Meiou Setsuna," replied the woman, her voice cool and smooth, revealing nothing, "and I am your past self."

Nabiki stared at the other woman incredulously, but Setsuna wasn't looking back. Instead, Nabiki could see the older woman staring at the left side of the gate with a strange expression. Following her gaze, Nabiki saw black-hilted katana with half its blade buried in the gate, but when she looked back at her companion, Setsuna was looking at her again, that red-eyed gaze seeming to staring into her soul.

A moment later, Setsuna nodded and walked to the right side of the gate. "Just remember, you are still you." Without another word, she inserted her staff into a hole, and Nabiki's world went white.

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Nabiki gasped awake, sweat pouring down her face as she sat up in her bed. Her mind was filled with images and memories of a life she hadn't lived, one where she was Meiou Setsuna in a time where magic was commonplace and people lived on planets and moons all over the solar system. Apparently, a life that had lasted for over a thousand years, and the deluge of information and feelings nearly overwhelmed her. After nearly half an hour just lying there, trying to sort through the enormous number of memories, Nabiki decided that it was a futile effort. Unsteadily, she rose and made her way to the furo, hoping a long soak would help her sort through all the experiences she had inherited from a woman dead twenty millennia…or at least ease the headache caused by having all those memories suddenly dumped in her mind.

It was still dark outside when she walked through the tearoom, and a glace at the clock informed her that it was five thirty in the morning. 'Just one more thing to annoy me,' she reflected, not being a morning person. Thankfully, the light was on in the kitchen, Kasumi making breakfast, so that meant that she had already prepared the furo for the morning. 'And I thought having strange dreams was bad.'

Of course, now she knew that her 'strange dreams' were actually her past life's memories trying to surface, but that knowledge didn't help much. Earlier in the night she had been awakened by a dream of watching the surface of the moon being destroyed by a man in armor, a man she now knew, from the new memories, as Sailor Charon, her past self's husband and Senshi of Space and Death. After waking, Nabiki had gotten a glass of water and sat at the table in the tearoom, and surprisingly, Ranma had joined her…or at least tried to. It almost made her chuckle, thinking of the circumstances that had led to the pigtailed boy's late-night swim in the koi pond, but the ensuing argument between her younger sister and her stubborn iinazuke had caused both to completely ignore the middle Tendo daughter, despite the fact that Nabiki had still had tear tracks on her face at the time.

Entering the changing room outside the furo and stripping off her pajamas, Nabiki reflected on her warming relationship with her sister's fiancé, something she wouldn't have thought possible only half a year ago. Ever since Ranma and Akane had returned from China, Nabiki had been finding her feelings toward the pigtailed boy changing, and although she had disrupted the wedding nominally for her sister's benefit, the ice queen of Furinkan couldn't plead complete impartiality in her heart of hearts.

Walking into the furo and sitting on one of the washing stools, Nabiki rinsed off the night's sweat and gave herself a quick scrub. It wasn't as though she was in love with Ranma or anything, but the gender-changing martial artist was someone she now thought of as at least a friend. But….

Nabiki physically shook her head to stop that train of thought; she had enough to worry about with those new memories from her past life. Rinsing off, Nabiki stepped into the furo, soaking a washcloth in the hot water and placing it on her forehead to relax her headache away while she tried to make sense of the copious number of images from her past life. Unfortunately, though the hot washcloth did soothe her headache, the memories were too numerous and jumbled to make any sense, and after about an hour's soak, Nabiki gave up, stepping out of the furo and walking to the door.

The middle Tendo sister had just picked up her towel when the door slid open, and a naked, damp, female Ranma walked in, freezing when she discovered that the furo was not unoccupied. Nabiki allowed a mercenary smile to form on her face, asking, "Something you wanted, Saotome?"

"Nabiki!" Ranma exclaimed, and then babbled out, "the sign wasn't up and I didn't know you were in here and sorry!"

After wrapping the towel she was holding around her torso, Nabiki replied, "Don't worry about it, Saotome. I forgot to put up the sign."

Ranma blink-blinked, and Nabiki began to walk out of the furo, but as she passed the redhead, she whispered, "Ranma, can we talk after school?"

It took Ranma a moment to answer, but she whispered back, "Sure, Nabiki. How 'bout under the bridge."

Nabiki nodded, feeling better now that she knew she could talk to someone, and impulsively, the normally cold girl gave the redhead a quick kiss on the cheek, leaving her standing there, frozen in shock, as Nabiki made her way back to her room to get ready for school.

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Both the indications of Deathbuster activity and the Silver Millennium energy readings had come from a Terran city called Tokyo on an island off the coast of mainland Asia, and Sailors Uranus and Neptune had teleported there to search for signs of either. Unfortunately, their search had proven fruitless so far, and the two of them were taking a break, having a late lunch at a small kissa near Tokyo Tower.

"I know the scans weren't conclusive," said Haruka in an annoyed voice, "but shouldn't we have seen some sign of the Deathbusters or other Senshi?"

"Have patience, love," replied Michiru, as unflappable as ever. "We've only been searching for a day."

"I know," Haruka sighed, "but if the Deathbusters are really here, we're going to have to move fast. We can't let them get the Holy Grail."

Michiru was about to reply when a quiet tone sounded from her purse, and the turquoise-haired woman reached in and retrieved a small, hand-held terminal of Mercurian design that connected to the computers in Castle Neptune.

"Sensors are detecting Silver Millennium energy nearby," Michiru whispered, and without another word, the two sometime Outers stood. Pausing just long enough to pay for their meal, Haruka then followed Michiru out of the café and into a nearby alley. Once they were sure no one was watching, both women transformed into their Senshi guises and clasped hands, teleporting to a rooftop near the source of the Silver Millennium energy.

Uranus scanned the nearby buildings while Neptune attempted to clarify the scan results, but such clarification proved unnecessary when a girl in a blue fuku flew out of a window in the school across the street and rolled to her feet. Startled, Uranus asked, "Is that Mercury?"

Before Neptune could answer, a strange female creature with two red antennae sticking out of its forehead floated out of the same window Mercury had used to exit the building and took a position above the blue-haired Senshi. A moment later, Venus, Jupiter, and Mars also arrived on the scene. It was obviously a battle in progress, and the two Outer Senshi crouched on their rooftop to observe it.

"I don't know what kind of monster that is," Uranus whispered to her companion, "but it's not a daimon."

"You're right, it isn't a Deathbuster creation," replied Neptune. "Let's see how the Inners handle this one. It's so incredible that all of them are back together after being reincarnated."

Uranus nodded, and the battle picked up pace as Mercury launched a Shine Aqua Illusion at the monster, freezing off one of its antennae. The creature retaliated by splitting into numerous illusions—or possibly clones—and attacking, but a dual blast of fire and electricity, courtesy of Mars and Jupiter, quickly cut down the numbers. Venus took care of the remaining illusions/clones with her Love-Me Chain, and Mercury shot another blast of super-cold at the monster, freezing it from the waist down.

"Sailor Moon!" yelled Mercury, loudly enough for the Outers to hear, "Do it now!"

Another girl in a blue fuku with red bows appeared from the broken window with a large scepter in her hand, and Neptune asked, "Who's that? There wasn't a Senshi of the Moon during the Silver Millennium!"

Uranus shrugged, looking a puzzled as her lover, and after the ensuing light show, the creature disintegrated. Nodding in unison, Neptune and Uranus joined hands and teleported back to Uranus' castle on Titania before dropping their uniforms.

"Well," began Haruka, "I guess, who ever that enemy is, the Inners don't need our help against them."

"I agree," replied Michiru, "but I still think we need to continue searching for the Deathbusters. What ever that monster was, its power was nothing compared to their daimons."

"Right," the blonde woman answered. "We're going to need a base of operations on Terra if we're going to keep searching; teleporting back and forth from either of our castles would be too tiring. Why don't you rent an apartment for us in Tokyo, and I'll keep up the search?"

Michiru nodded her agreement and then walked toward Haruka, a sultry smile on her face. "Tomorrow is soon enough for that, don't you think, love? And I can think of at least one thing we haven't done in nearly twenty thousand years."

Haruka replied by drawing Michiru into a passionate embrace, kissing her deeply, and leading the green-haired woman to her bedroom for a much-needed night of reacquaintance.

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Ranma was practicing under the bridge when Nabiki arrived, running through a kata of his own design as he attempted to incorporate some of his opponents' techniques into his style. The bakusai tenketsu had been easy enough to learn after seeing Ryouga use the technique myriad times, and now he was concentrating on learning Mousse's hidden weapon technique with similar success. The pigtailed martial artist couldn't yet carry the sheer volume that the myopic boy could, but he was getting better each day.

"Hi Ranma," called Nabiki after the black-haired boy ceased moving. "Thanks for meeting me here."

"No prob, Nabiki," he replied. "Is anything wrong? You were crying last night."

"I've been having strange dreams," she answered, her tone a bit nervous, "but the last one, after we all went back to bed last night, was the strangest of all."

"Actually," Ranma said in an uncertain voice, "I've been having some weird dreams too."

Nabiki's eyes widened at the pigtailed boy's declaration, and she asked, "Like what?"

"Ah, weird stuff, like me wearing black armor and fighting with a katana," Ranma answered, scratching the back of his head and looking away. "Or using some weird power to destroy what was left of a city on the moon. Weird stuff like that."

When Nabiki didn't reply after a few seconds, Ranma look back at the girl and discovered that her face was a study in incredulity, eyes and mouth wide.

"What?" he asked, put off balance by Nabiki's show of emotion.

"That was exactly like my dream; the one I had before you found me in the tea room…except that I was watching Charon do all that."

Now it was Ranma's turn to act surprised, especially when Nabiki mention that name. "How is it possible that we're both having the same dream?"

"I don't know, Ranma," answered Nabiki, her voice breathless. "But maybe we should keep this to ourselves for now."

"Umm…shouldn't we ask someone about this?" asked Ranma. "Maybe the old ghoul?"

"Give me some time to think about this first, Ranma," the brown-haired girl replied. "Maybe until tomorrow afternoon. Can you meet me here then?"

"Sure."

With that, Nabiki walked over to the embankment and sat down, looking like she was doing some hard thinking. Guessing that the conversation was over for the moment, Ranma went back to his kata, even more puzzled about his dreams now that he knew that Nabiki was sharing them.

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Author's Notes (10/13/8)

Well, it's been a long time coming, but finally, I am continuing Charon. I hope all those that messaged me insisting that I continue this story are happy with the results, so please review. Not much else to say. Later all.


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